"PREHISTORIC OCTOPUS" is the definitive expression of my love for creepy underwater settings, deep sea legends and sci-fi horror ambiences. Witness the terrifying attack of a large, primal cephalopod hunting for food and grabbing its latest prey with its slithering arms of death!
Here I am back with my second octopus-themed project inspired by "MEG 2: THE TRENCH", a film that I literally adored for its ultra-realistic creature animations and underwater settings and that further shaped my love for CG creature animation.
Above you can see a collage clip of the main reference materials I studied and used to give life to the mega-octopus. I primarily used giant pacific octopus footage, which provided good reference for how a boneless creature moves through the water.
This multiview animation breakdown shows the different perspectives of the animation workflow, from reference to polished animation and right into the final look.
Just like my previous KRAKEN project, I animated using the straight-ahead approach that allowed me to deal with the natural motion flow of each tentacle (sorry "arm") and then polished the curves in the graph by making them intentionally soft and fluid.
The rigs used for this short offered cool features for realistic interaction between the predatory sea monster and the human victim, especially the IK system of the tentacles and the man's facial expressions of fear and terror.
As for these final clips, you can see how all layers were integrated together in the final version, from the simple clay model to final render with the underwater background, Arnold fog and green screen bubbles effect.